Cold. When Reggie Vandergriff opened the door to his house, it was cold. Far too cold. Reggie could feel in his bones that something was very wrong. He walked into the house.
“Lucinda?” he called. “I’m back!” He heard no reply. “Lucinda? Why have you not come at once to greet me?”
He now knew for a fact that something was wrong, for every day when he came home from work, his wife, Lucinda Vandergriff, would greet him. But today she was nowhere to be found. Reggie checked in the kitchen, in the garage, under the couch cushions, and even in the bathroom, but still he found no trace of Lucinda.
Finally, Reggie burst into the bedroom, only to find Lucinda lying in a heap on the floor.
“Dear Lucinda!” he cried. “Why are you lying in a heap on the floor?”
“Oh Reggie!” she said. “Those silly kids have been up to their youthful shenanigans again! They broke in through the back window and stole our refrigerator!”
“Good heavens!” said Reggie. “That refrigerator had all our food in it! However shall we survive? We are doomed to starve to death!”
But suddenly, a most brilliant idea formed in Reggie’s head. “What if I go to Burgertory, our local fast food establishment, and buy some of their chemically hazardous cuisine? Perhaps it will provide us with some sustenance.”
Lucinda met his gaze and smiled weakly. “That- that is a most wonderful idea.” As the words left her lips, she passed out in exhaustion.
“Have no fear, my darling,” whispered Reggie. “Your fate is safe in my hands.”
And so, Reggie began his trip to Burgertory. He climbed into his Toyota Echo, started a playlist of songs by his favorite band, Pppönk, and drove off.
Eventually, Reggie came to a red light. Another car, an old, rusty jalopy, pulled up next to him, and he noticed with some surprise that it was being driven by a cactus. Reggie smiled and waved to the cactus, but the cactus, clearly having never been taught any manners, didn’t wave back.
How rude, thought Reggie. The light turned green, and Reggie drove on. When he looked back, the cactus and its car were both gone.
As Reggie drove, the thought of the cactus continued to trouble him. Why didn’t it wave back? he thought. Does it have some sort of unnatural aversion to waving?
Suddenly, without any warning, a car rammed into the side of Reggie’s echo. Time seemed to stop, and as Reggie took in his surrounings, he realized his car was flying through the air, and the car that had rammed into him was that same jalopy, driven by the cactus. The Echo landed upside down on the side of the street. For a moment, Reggie thought the cactus would get out of its car to finish him off, but instead it just drove away.
Reggie pulled himself of his ruined Echo. “What am I to do now?” he cried out in intense anguish. “My wife is starving to death, and I’m stuck here without a car! How shall I ever get to Burgertory?”
But then, he had another most brilliant idea. “I shall walk to Burgertory!”
And so, Reggie Vandergriff began walking to Burgertory.
For what may have been a week, Reggie walked without rest, finally stopping when he could see Burgertory on the horizon. He was standing in a park, surrounded by fresh green grass and its disgusting grass smell. Thin beams of light shined through the treetops, illuminating a figure off in the distance. There was something familiar about this figure, so Reggie walked nearer to get a closer look. It was then that he realized the figure was actually one of many, a group of figures. They were the silly kids who had stolen his refrigerator!
“Halt, you rapscallions!” Reggie yelled at them.
The kids, ranging from ages seven to thirty-two, turned and glared at him menacingly.
“You stole my refrigerator,” said Reggie. “And I want it back.”
The kids just looked at each other and laughed.
“Now look here, you miscreants!” Reggie yelled. “I want that refrigerator back!”
From the back of the group of kids came eight year old Ross, their leader. “If you want your refrigerator back,” he said in his gravelly bass voice, “you’ll have to fight me for it.”
So Reggie and Ross fought in an intense match of Chinese checkers. The match lasted for days, but in the end, Reggie managed to prevail.
“Now give me my refrigerator,” growled Reggie.
But Ross began to weep profusely. “I am sorry, but I cannot return your refrigerator. We destroyed it hours ago! This means I cannot keep my promise to you! I have failed!” Tears streamed down his face.
“Maybe you can just buy me a new one or something,” suggested Reggie.
“No!” screamed Ross. “You don’t understand! I have failed to keep a promise, and have brought dishonor to my family! There is only one solution: I must perish!” He then pulled out a bomb.
As the bomb exploded, Reggie ran away as fast as he could, trying to escape, but a piece of shrapnel struck him in the back of his left leg, filling it with immense pain. He fell to the ground, unable to get back up.
“Now how will I get to Burgertory?” he yelled out in despair. Then he realized there was still a way for him to finish his journey. He would drag himself to Burgertory.
And so, Reggie Vandergriff set off crawling to Burgertory. He crawled for eons, until he finally arrived in Burgertory’s parking lot.
“I’ve made it at last!” he exclaimed jubilantly.
He dragged himself across the hard concrete, ignoring the extreme pain, until he heard a click underneath himself. A click. He had crawled over a landmine!
He began to cry. He had no hope. His wife would starve to death, and he would die in a fiery explosion as soon as he moved. He lay on the landmine for hours, crying without pause.
But then, all of a sudden, he heard the flapping of wings, and the booming “SCREEEEE” of a great bird, and before he knew it, he was swept up in the claws of a giant albatross. The majestic bird of the sea carried him up into the air and then back to the ground, where it deposited him at the front door of Burgertory.
Reggie thanked the avian, then dragged himself through the front door and to the register with great joy. But what he saw next shocked him. The cashier was the cactus who had totaled his car!
In his burning rage, Reggie forgot the pain in his leg, stood up, and punched the cactus in the face, or where its face would’ve been if it had one. The cactus, now defeated, fell to the ground and burst into flames. Reggie, having vanquished his nemesis, grabbed two nutritionally questionable burgers and climbed back onto the albatross, who then flew him back to his house.
“Lucinda, I got the sustenance!” he exclaimed as he entered his house. But Lucinda was gone. That’s when he noticed the note lying on the floor. He picked it up. It smelled like Lucinda’s perfume, a horrible smell that Reggie found revolting. He read it aloud.
“Dear Reggie,” he read. “I have left you for a used vacuum cleaner salesman from Sweden. Goodbye forever. Sincerely, Lucinda.”
Reggie fell to his knees and wept. What good was not starving to death, if he had no one to enjoy life with? But then he looked over and saw the burgers he had worked so hard to attain.
“Well,” he said to himself. “What’s a guy to do?” And so he ate.